Two wars, two realities

By Joe Garner
Rocky Mountain News
Updated: 6:05 a.m. ET March 13, 2004

March 13, 2004 - Every war descends to its own unique hell.

And while a fear of death and visions of home are the constants bequeathed by one generation of soldiers to the next, the war in Iraq has created its own singular legacy during the past year.

 "Now we must learn about using reservists, embedded journalists, unit-rotation systems, nation-building, keeping the peace and taking care of the troops - especially those who are disabled from injuries, both physical and mental," said Charles Figley, a Florida State University professor on a sabbatical leave at Kuwait University.

 For many Americans, especially the baby boomers who came of age during the 1960s, Vietnam is the benchmark against which they understand war.

 They find themselves comparing America's longest war - Vietnam ebbed and flowed from 1957 through 1975 - and the war that will mark its first year on Friday, a year that started with "shock and awe" and continues with a bloody drumbeat today.

The wars are similar and different, heightened by the technological rush that has made Iraq the first phone-home war in world history:

Reconstruction

• Fighting in Vietnam was in jungles and rice paddies; combat "in the sandbox," as soldiers call the Iraqi theater, has been in the desert and in cities.

 Some soldiers consider Iraq's urban warfare a prototype of future wars in an increasingly urbanized world, overlaid with the Army's stated responsibility to rebuild any conquered nation as part of American foreign policy.

 "A significant part of our future mission will be nation-building and stability operations," said Christopher McConnell, 28, a CSU senior who will be commissioned a second lieutenant when he graduates in May. He expects orders for Iraq by early next year, although he also expects "the mission will keep us there 10 years."

 Top generals have told Congress that the Army, for planning purposes, assumes it will keep roughly 100,000 troops in Iraq for at least another two years.

That means a new generation of American soldiers will learn lessons only combat can teach.

"I don't know if you can accurately describe what combat is like," said Army Capt. Jeff McCoy, 31, an ROTC instructor at CSU who served as a reconnaissance officer at the tip of the spear pointed toward Baghdad last spring.

 "It varies from person to person," McCoy said. "What I try to bring out in my discussions is what worked and what didn't work, because (the cadets) all want to know."

 Combat

• "Asymmetrical" fighting is a mark of both Iraq and Vietnam, where American troops have not been engaged by a traditional, stand-and-fight enemy.

 "We are facing guerrilla-style forces dedicated to fighting - no matter how outnumbered they are," said McConnell, the CSU cadet.

 Vietnam veterans understand the constant unsettling torment of knowing that the person smiling at you by day may be aiming at you by night.

 "Anticipating fear causes as much stress as an actual combat incident," said Lt. Col Laurel Anderson, a psychiatric nurse deployed to Fort Carson with her

Army Reserve unit. "It's very difficult being terrified from the moment you get up until you go to sleep, if you can go to sleep."

 Media

• The news media, especially television, brought Vietnam combat into American living rooms night after night, all blood and body bags. For the drive to

Baghdad in Operation Iraqi Freedom, the military invited reporters to ride along - a process called "embedding" that made reporters part of the military team.

 Women

• Women have a new prominence in American fighting forces compared with the Vietnam War. In an all-volunteer Army, members of the Army Reserve and National Guard also have been called on since there no longer are draftees to take up the slack.

 Counseling

• Among Vietnam-era veterans, the most remarkable difference since their war is the Army's front-and-center approach to dealing with soldiers' psychological struggles after combat.

"We didn't get any counseling at all," said Sgt. 1st Class Steven Shafer, a Vietnam veteran and Army Reservist who, at 56, is at Fort Carson to train troops bound for Iraq. "The first counseling I got was at a vets center, but that was 10 years later - after I'd been through depression, anxiety and thoughts of suicide."

 Despite ongoing treatment, " Vietnam still dogs me," Shafer said.

Based on a 1987 study by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, about 9,000 Vietnam veterans committed suicide, most of them in the first five years after returning home, said Ernie Chavez, chairman of the CSU psychology department.

 "The military is better prepared for mental health issues than they were in Vietnam," Chavez said. "They learned from Vietnam."

Soldiers

• Vietnam was fought with a largely conscripted force, while Iraq is being contested with an all-volunteer force - perhaps the fundamental difference that has kept the United States committed to the current war.

"We no longer have the draft, so the soldiers I deal with are all volunteers," said Master Sgt. Ron Johnson, 56, another reservist at Fort Carson whose military career began in Vietnam. "The difference between the drafted military and the volunteer military is the professionalism and pride with which they are doing their job."

There are no public plans for a return of the draft to keep peace in Iraq, however long the commitment turns out to be.

"If the draft was reinstated, the equation would change quickly and dramatically," said John Straayer, a political scientist at Colorado State University.

"The large bulk of America has had the luxury of going about their daily lives as if no war is going on."

From one perspective, the argument is to stay the course.

"If we hadn't left Iraq so quickly the first time, the world might have looked at us differently and 9-11 would never have occurred," said Ron "Doc" Ross, 65, a Marine medical corpsman in Vietnam. He volunteers at the Grand Junction VA hospital to help other veterans with the paperwork to claim their benefits.

 But a commitment to a conservative Islamic country with different cultural and historical traditions may defy the American demand for a quick fix.

 Just as Vietnam defied a quick fix, miring the country in a foreign morass more than a generation ago.

"I sense a creeping doubt in Americans' minds to the wisdom of this adventure," Straayer said. "The longer this goes on, the more trepidation, doubt and worry there will be to outweigh the positive feelings."

The length of the Vietnam War cast a shadow over at least three presidencies. The shadow was darkened by social, political and family divisions between hawks who supported the war and doves who supported mass protests to oppose it.

 After 18 years in Vietnam, after more than $150 billion had been spent and 58,000 soldiers' lives had been lost, U.S. combat forces, for the first time, failed to achieve their objective. The loss hurt the pride of many Americans, leaving them with bitter memories.

Almost 30 years later, a good number of Vietnam veterans support President Bush's policy to remove Saddam Hussein and create a democratic, free-market Iraq because the 1991 war failed to oust the dictator.

"There was a lot unfinished after the first Gulf War," said Ross, the West Slope veteran.

"As far as I am concerned, the first President Bush should have gone right into Baghdad after Saddam Hussein," Ross said. "He was the guy who invaded Kuwait like Hitler invaded Poland."

 That said, Ross favors staying the course in Iraq to rebuild the country and its military, so the United States can chalk up a success in nation-building to counterbalance the failure of Vietnam.

garnerj@RockyMountainNews.com
or 303-892-5421

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4519892/